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Before the lawsuit, Buck knew he could always rely on his captain to be there for him. Not just for on the job things, but for more. Buck had only just really been becoming a part of the 118 family, going out with them and hanging out outside of work.
The first time it happened It was three in the morning, Buck woke up sobbing and panting, clawing at his chest as if that would help him to breath better as the remnants of his nightmare clouded reality. When he was younger and had a nightmare, he would call out to Maddie and she would rush across the hall to his room and comfort him before he woke his parents up, but at this point, he hadn't spoken to Maddie in years. He found himself reaching for his phone and for a moment, considered calling Abby, the 911 call lady that he'd become friends with.
Instead, as if his hands were on autopilot, his thumb hovered over Bobby's name. He heard his phone ring, without even registering that he had pressed call. Once, twice, three times Buck thought about hanging up but right before he could, a sleep deepened "Hello?" rings out in the cool quiet of Buck's room.
"Bobby," Buck breathes a shaky sigh of relief at the familiar and comforting voice.
"Buck, it's the middle of the night, is everything okay?" Bobby didn't sound angry, he didn't at all sound like a man who had just been woken up well after midnight after an extremely long and grouping night. He sounded like a man who was worried though, something that caused a small pang in Buck's chest. It's been a while since he's had someone to worry about.
"It's nothing, I'm sorry for calling you this late," Buck whispers into the call, voice hesitant as his insecurities came to the surface. He wanted comfort from his captain but not more than he didn't want to bother the man.
Bobby seemed to realise instantly, having been able to read the youngest member of the 118 right from the start, he didn't know why, but he knew that right now, Buck just needed someone to talk to. He also had no idea why he of all people had been called.
"It's no problem Buckley, hey, while I've got you on the phone, did you check the rosters?" Bobby knew he was scraping the bottom of the bucket for ideas to organically keep the conversation going, at least until he could tell that Buck was okay as his breathing had yet to slow from the clearly panicked breathing it had been.
Surprisingly to him, it worked and they talked for the next hour and a half until Buck's breathing evened out on the phone, morphing into small snores as Bobby talked about whatever food he was planning on making next.
After that, Bobby kept an eye out on Buck, his worry for the young man ever-present and it took him a while to realise that he wasn't worried because he didn't trust the boy, he was worried because he liked the boy. He somehow had managed to adopt this young man into his family. Suddenly, somehow, instead of it just being Bobby Nash and his family of ghosts, Even Buckley was there too.
The next time it happened was after the incident with the ladder truck, Buck was still struggling even with walking up and down the stairs. He was asleep on the couch until just after midnight when he woke up, a scream trapped in his throat and without hesitation grabbed his phone and rang Bobby. He didn't even stop to think about calling anyone else, he could have called Maddie, or Eddie. A week ago he could have called Ali too but she'd left him.
"Hello?" Bobby's voice rings out just as it had the last time; if a little quieter.
"Bobby, I- I- can't," Buck stutters, emotions tying his tongue in a knot. He can hear Athena's voice in the background just barely but his attention is snapped back to Bobby.
"Buck, I'll be over in fifteen minutes okay? just stay put," Buck nods as the call cuts off waiting in the dark.
Just as promised, fifteen minutes later the lock of the front door clicks as Bobby uses his copy of the key to let himself in. "Buck, where are you at kid?" He calls out. Buck can hear Bobby's small steps as he felt his way around the dark unfamiliar apartment.
"In here," He replies quietly.
"Hey son, are you alright?" Bobby asks crouching down beside the couch and putting himself in front of Buck. Buck can feel the tears building up in his eyes and spilling over the edge. "Alright alright, come here," Bobby grabs Bucks shoulders, lifting and moving him like a rag doll, maneuvering the both of them so that bobby was sitting in one corner of the couch with Buck's head pillowed in his lap.
He feels Buck bury his face in his thigh, tears dampening the tracksuit pants bobby had picked up off the floor half an hour earlier. Bobby cards his hands through Buck's hair, being thrown back for a moment to how he used to comfort his kids in a similar way. He isn't surprised when within the next twenty minutes Buck cries himself to sleep with soft hands still combing through his curls like Maddie used to do.
Buck wakes up to Bobby's alarm and opens his eyes to find him still in the man's lap with his legs pulled up to his chest. He felt like a child again, especially with the way Bobby's arms were protectively caging him in. He felt safe.
Bobby hugs him tight before he leaves, pressing his lips to his hair and telling him "Thank you for calling me, you can call me whenever you need to okay?"
The words were reassuring at the time but weeks later, when Buck woke up gasping, tears running down his cheeks, he wasn't sure.
It was one of the few times that Buck genuinely thought he'd fucked up with the lawsuit. When he woke up, in the middle of the night, wanting, no, needing the parental comfort that his captain had given in the past. But he couldn't call him, he wasn't sure Bobby would answer the phone if he did.
So he sat there, staring at his captains' name on his phone, even as his tears blurred the letters, unable to call him.
Bobby was mad. Like visibly and clearly angry, even after almost everyone else in the team had forgiven him. Right now though, it didn't matter to Buck, right now, he needed Bobby and he just hoped that the older man still cared enough about him to pick up his call anyway.
The phone rang.
"Hello? Buck?"
"Hey Bobby, I ah, look I, I don't" Buck lets out a frustrated sigh at his own inability to get his thoughts and words straight.
"Shhh, calm down kid, it'll be okay, I'll be over there in twenty okay?" Bobby says and Buck hears Athena ask where he's going right before the man hangs up.
Buck paces the floor in front of his kitchen, anxiety weighing on his chest.
What if Bobby came over just to tell him to never call him again? to tell him he hates him? that he isn't good enough?
The door opens interrupting Buck's spiralling thoughts. He swivels in his spot coming face to face with Bobby's worried gaze. He feels his chest tighten and his hands begin to shake as the thoughts 'He hates me, why did I call him, he wants nothing to do with me, he hates me,' run through his head like a track team training for a competition while on crack.
He didn't see Bobby move forward, didn't notice it until he was being pulled into his arms. "I'm so sorry, oh kid I'm so sorry," Bobby whispered as Buck shook in his arms, clinging on to the soft shirt he'd slept in. "Come on, let's get you back upstairs to bed,"
"No, don't leave me again please," Buck sobs into his captains' shirt. Bobby just holds him tighter, looking up at the ceiling in an attempt to prevent the tears from escaping from his eyes. "I promise, Buck I promise I'm not going anywhere,"
Buck lets himself get pulled upstairs; pliant as a rag doll once more as Bobby lays them both down. Buck instantly curls up in his chest once more.
Athena had heard Bobby's phone ring, distant and almost incorporated into her dream. She'd heard her husbands voice, muttering into the phone. It wasn't the first time he had gotten a call in the middle of the night. "I'll be over there in twenty okay?" His voice pulls her completely out of her sleep.
"Where are you going, baby?" She asks as he pulls his phone from his ear.
"Out, I'll see you later," Bobby tells her cryptically, not intentionally so, but as he rushed to grab his clothes and keys she watched on.
He didn't give her a kiss goodbye either, something he always does.
It wasn't the first time he'd left in the middle of the night after some phone call. Last time she hadn't seen him until the next day when he was clearly tired and sore.
After the first time, she had done her best to ignore it, she trusted her husband, of course. But a second time? it may not be a pattern yet but it wasn't exactly a coincidence either.
She didn't want to think that her husband was cheering on her. Bobby was a good guy, one of the best but so are Michael and Hen. It isn't an implausible theory, not at all. So the next morning, when she wakes up for her early morning shift, she notices that her husband still isn't home.
And so she does what any sane policewoman with a husband she suspects of cheating would do. She calls in a favour to check where her husbands' car was currently.
It doesn't take long, within half an hour of making the call, she's sitting in front of a familiar building and with a call to one of her other friends and a claim that her husband had "lost his phone," she had him tracked to an apartment and room.
She felt bad about what she was doing, of course, but this early in the morning, she just needed to know.
She fines herself face to face with the door her husband is behind. She stops herself from knocking and tries the handle instead. her eyebrow twitches upwards in surprise as the door falls open almost silently. Once the door is open, she has to hold back a hysterical laugh as she recognises the apartment.
From her place at the bottom of the stairs she can see her husbands sleeping figure in the bed. She carefully walks up the steps trying not to make a sound but when she comes up closer to the bed to find Evan Buckley wrapped around her husband like a koala while Bobby had a protective hand on his shoulder. Both fast asleep.
She managed to get a couple of photos, sending them off to the 118 group chat.
'And i thought it was Eddie that Buck wanted to get into bed' was the response that she got from one Howie Han. Everyone ignored Eddie's confused 'what?' and went on to gush about how adorable the two were.
The buzzing of her phone must have woken the two of them up because soon both Buck and Bobby were opening their eyes to Athena Nash with a self-satisfied smirk and her arms crossed across her chest.
Buck lifts his head from Bobby's chest looking around in confusion. Now that his eyes were open, Athena could see how red and puffy they were from crying the night before which made her cocky demeanour melt a little bit.
"'Thena? what're you doing here," Bobby asks, words slurred as he sits up.
"Just wanted to find my husband and his mistress," Athena replies causing Buck to let out a chuckle.
After that, Athena didn't worry when Bobby got up randomly in the middle of the night, she knew exactly where he was going to be. Buck went and started seeing Frank again and the midnight phone calls died down a little. Almost three years later, after Eddie and Buck finally realised their feelings and moved in together, the calls practically stopped; only ever happening when Buck had a nightmare so bad that Eddie couldn't comfort him. Athena didn't mind. She loved that Bobby was always there for Buck, it may not be by blood but that boy was as much his son and Harry and May were her kids.